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It's hard for me these days......after all the crazy stories I've been believing for years.....being atheist is like calling my mom, and entire family, a liar, and that's difficult to do.

They're unique. They aren't just Christian. They have countless stories of supernatural happenings to back up their beliefs. All of which I grew up believing to be true. It became my reality. Now, I know they're not true, which is hard to comprehend. Why would anyone make these things up? Or are they that messed up that they actually believe these things truly happened? It's horrible. To this day, even knowing in myself that it's a bunch of bull, I can't sleep without a night light.

My mom as a teenager dabbled in the world of spirit writing, which she believes has followed her around from house to house, state to state for many years now. While in the house she grew up in she spent many of her days taking care of her brothers and sisters, as my grandparents were never around to do it themselves. She claims that her spirit writing cursed her, her family and the house that they lived in.

One day she was washing the walls in the hallway while her baby sister sat nearby watching her. She stared up at the ceiling and began going into convulsions. My mom called an ambulance. "As soon as they removed her from the house, she stopped." That's one of the more believable stories.

Another, she had just finished cleaning the kitchen and moved on to the living-room. In the kitchen were linoleum floors. All her brothers and sisters were at the park, she was home completely alone. As she cleaned the living-room, she heard a chair pull out from the table in the kitchen. Upon inspection, she saw the chair had indeed pulled out. She looked around, no one was there. She pushed the chair back in and returned to the living-room. She heard it again. Once again, the chair had moved. Bewildered, she started looking around to see if one of her brothers or sisters was playing an evil trick on her. She went outside and looked down the road and all of them were just then rounding the corner returning from the park.

One of the more bizarre stories is backed up by another witness, my aunt. The three sisters share a room. Unable to sleep, they both were just laying in bed while their baby sister lay sleeping in her crib in the corner of the room. I'm not sure of the order of events but both of them saw a dark cloud hover over the crib. Their beds raised off the floor and began to shake.

Now, mind you, these women are now full grown adults and will swear to this day that these things actually happened. My mother also has many other stories (which were while I was alive) of seeing ghosts in our house, any house we lived in. She would leave bibles open in every room. It wasn't until she became "born again" that these things stopped.

Like I said, I still can't sleep without a night light. I am scared. Although I tell myself over and over that theres no such thing as ghosts, I walk up the stairs frantically staring behind me then up the stairs again, then behind me, then up the stairs, while struggling not to fall down as I pick up the pace with every stair.

Ghosts have been made my reality. This is by far the hardest part for me. Knowing the bible is a bunch of bull, I can do. I know deep down that what I believe as an atheist is the truth. Sleeping in the dark, that's another story.

Now that I have a child of my own, I don't want him to even think there's a such thing as Santa. If some guy who flies through the air with magic reindeer can materialize into your house by way of your chimney, why couldn't there be a monster in your closet? Or a ghost? Or a bloody Mary?

The constant battle to hold my own beliefs separate from my family doesn't bother me much anymore, it's this. This is how Christianity has scared me.